STREATOR — Soon, the blood-drenched legacy of George Poundstone will return home, more than 150 years after his patriotic sacrifice for Old Glory.

Shot twice by overwhelming Confederate forces, Poundstone made his final battlefield decision. He tucked his regiment’s Union flag — sewn together near his home in LaSalle County— under his tunic, hoping to hide the banner from souvenir-hungry rebels. Then Poundstone fell from a third musket blast, blood pouring from his chest and staining the Stars and Stripes.

Though Southern soldiers did snatch the flag, it eventually — in a great, nationwide mystery — ended up north of the Mason-Dixon line years later.

Thanks to recent fundraisers in LaSalle County, the Poundstone flag likely will return home for display this summer — the red, white and blue tinged especially red as a testament to colors he held sacred.

As David Reed, president of the Streatorland Historical Society, says, “That blood is part of history.”

Cannon to right of them,

Cannon to left of them,

Cannon in front of them

Volley’d and thunder’d.

Aside from one brief but brave battlefield moment, history remembers little of George Poundstone.

“He was just your average guy,” says Reed, the former president of the LaSalle County Historical Society.

The Poundstone family held a large swath of property north of what now is Streator but then was just open farmland. The Poundstone farm included a lucrative cattle-breeding operation, tended by five Poundstone brothers. So, by standards of the day, George Poundstone would be in a comfortable position. Further, as far as financial obligations, he had no dependents: by fall 1861, the 32-year-old had yet to marry or have children.

At that same time, the Illinois 53rd Voluntary Infantry was organized in Ottawa, the bustling county seat and site of an 1858 Lincoln-Douglas debate. Poundstone was older than the average 25-year-old soldier — and at a time when the average male life expectancy in this country was under 43 years.

“He would’ve been one of the oldest of the regiment,” Reed says.

During training, Poundstone earned the respect of the regiment. He was voted to a prestigious post on the color guard.

In a typical regiment of about 1,000 men, anywhere from eight to 10 would be chosen to carry the colors. One man each would carry two flags — one for the Union, the other for the regiment — while the others would guard the two standard-bearers.

Page 2 of 5 - The banners were critical to warfare of the day. In the brutal, tight combat, soldiers would look for the flags as a reminder of the cause and inspiration to fight on.

Plus, the flags played a key tactical role. From a vantage of a quarter- or half-mile away, officers would observe the fray, deciding what moves to make next. By watching flag movement — or, in a worst-case scenario, flag disappearance — commanders could judge the ebb and flow of battle.

With flags carrying so much importance, a regiment put much thought into a regiment’s color guard. Per the custom of the times, fellow soldiers picked members of the color guard. The 53rd Illinois Infantry would carry a U.S. flag crafted by women in LaSalle County, with Sgt. George Poundstone tabbed as the leader of the color guard.

“Only the truest, the bravest, the strongest soldiers got that honor,” Reed says.

But the post courted death. In the smoky tumult of battle, a man waiving a flag made for an easy target. And nothing made for a finer souvenir than an enemy banner.

In January 1862, the 53rd mustered into service. In Chicago, the regiment helped guard Confederate prisoners before moving on to Missouri and Tennessee. That spring, the regiment joined Union forces in Mississippi for the Siege of Corinth. There, outnumbered 4-1, the regiment nonetheless repelled rebs and held a key bridge for two hours until Union reinforcements arrived to secure the area.

After that, the regiment and war trudged on, well into the next year. July 1863 marked a massive turning point in the war. July 3 saw Robert E. Lee’s retreat at the Battle of Gettysburg, rebuffing Confederate efforts to invade the North. The next day in Mississippi brought the Siege of Vicksburg, with Union forces — including the 53rd Illinois Infantry — claiming control of the Mississippi River for the rest of the war.

Eight days later and 45 minutes to the east, the 53rd Illinois Infantry would be plunged into a skirmish remembered only as a blundering Civil War footnote — yet the site of a remarkable act of courage by a LaSalle County farmer.

“Forward, the Light Brigade!”

Was there a man dismay’d?

Not tho’ the soldier knew

Someone had blunder’d.

Until July 12, 1863, Brig. Gen. Jacob Lauman was known for nothing but battlefield success. The Burlington, Iowa, native especially earned respect as a colonel in late 1861, when he was severely wounded in action in Missouri but shrugged off his pain to returned to duty and lead a charge on an enemy fort.

At Vicksburg, he commanded the 4th Division, including the Illinois 53rd Infantry. Eight days later, for reasons that still leave historians boggled, he engaged four regiments — including the 53rd Illinois Infantry in a dubious skirmish in Jackson.

Page 3 of 5 - Poundstone and his 250 comrades found themselves charging headlong into hell. Surrounded by thousands of hidden Confederate forces, the regiment could do little to counter as an enormous fusillade of bullets and explosions rained down.

Maj. George Crosley, commanding the 3rd Iowa Infantry, which also participated in the charge, would later recall, “That someone had blundered in giving the order for that hopeless charge, we knew right well. The moment the enemy’s (overwhelming forces) came into view, and our skeleton brigade was ordered to assault them, we realized that it was a forlorn hope.”

Amid the instant chaos, Poundstone and others near the flag made for easy prey. As the New York Times recounted, “The color guard of eight men was annihilated.”

Still, Poundstone briefly stayed on his feet, despite taking two bullets, one to the thigh and another to the chest. He grabbed for his Union flag, hoping to hide it from rebels. He ripped the banner from its mast and jammed the cloth under his tunic.

Then a bullet blasted through his left eye, blowing out the back of his skull. Poundstone crumpled.

“Poundstone lay upon the field, drenching the colors with his blood,” the Times reported.

Somehow, he clung to life. Even if he should not survive, perhaps the flag would stay out of enemy hands.

But that was not to be. Astronomically overmatched, the Union regiments were defeated in just 40 minutes. Of the Illinois 53rd Infantry’s 250 soldiers, only 66 survived. The rest fell dead, or were wounded and captured.

Lauman would be relieved of his command by Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman. He was sent to the rear, then told to return home to Iowa to await further assignment. None ever came. He would die in Burlington in 1867, from lingering effects of his 1861 war wounds. Lauman asked for an investigation of the battle, but was refused. In his memoirs, Sherman recalls Lauman as “a most gallant and excellent officer.” Some history buffs defend him as a scapegoat in Jackson, but he is generally faulted for a horrible blunder on July 12, 1863.

Poundstone was left behind as rebels moved on from Jackson. Meanwhile, word of his injuries quickly reached his family in LaSalle County. Relatives arrived in Mississippi with a wagon, hoping to return with Poundstone and nurse him back to health. Instead, they returned with a corpse: Poundstone died six days after taking three rebel bullets. He was buried in the family plot: a faded sandstone marker marks his resting spot in Grand Ridge Cemetery.

At his funeral, the flag was long gone, sparking a mystery enduring to this day.

When can their glory fade?

O the wild charge they made!

All the world wondered.

Page 4 of 5 - Honor the charge they made

Somebody, perhaps while giving Poundstone medical aid, found the flag. But who kept it? Reed, the Streator historian, guesses the First Kentucky Brigade, in force at the Jackson skirmish, grabbed the banner as a souvenir.

“They brag about that in diaries,” Reed says.

Yet the flag’s whereabouts remained unknown until 1885. At the Washington, D.C., headquarters for the Department of War, the banner was spotted in basement storage.

“It was found by a janitor,” Reed says.

The discovery became a sensational mystery, touted not only by the New York Times but newspapers nationwide. How did the bloodied flag vanish in 1863 in Mississippi, only to turn up 22 years later in the nation’s capital?

“It made headlines throughout the country,” Reed says.

Though the 53rd Illinois Infantry had been mustered out of service in mid 1865, veterans of the regiment vowed to return the banner to Illinois. They succeeded: from 1886 to 1922, the flag was displayed in Springfield in the Capitol rotunda. In 1923, it was moved to the new state Centennial Building (now the Michael J. Howlett State Office Building) to be displayed in its Hall of Flags. But by 2003, state historians realized many of those flags were deteriorating and at risk. So, the Poundstone flag, with more than a thousand others, was put into protective storage at the Illinois State Military Museum.

Enter Reed. In 2012, he heard that a handful of those stored battle flags had been restored and displayed by civic and veterans groups. LaSalle County offers several visible sites for display, though Reed most favors the Streator Public Library.

“It’s a Carnegie library, so it has an ideal look and setting,” Reed says.

That decision will be made later. Right now, the flag is undergoing rehab, a pricey undertaking.

Bill Lear, curator of the state military museum, says painstaking flag repair can cost up to $40,000. In time, the museum hopes to learn how to do that work in-house, so the state can rehab and display many of its 1,000-plus war flags.

For now, though, the museum is letting outside groups cover those costs. The flags, fewer than 15 so far, remain state property but are loaned out for display.

“It’s win-win,” Lear says. “Private money covers the costs, and citizens get to see these flags.”

The cost of rehabbing the Poundstone flag was pegged at $15,000. So, for two years, Reed hit every civic and fraternal group possible, raising half that amount. Then, recently, the other half came from Bob Dieken, a local businessman.

Though Dieken has no military background, his father and uncle fought in World War II. He has helped advance many civic and historical projects in LaSalle County and beyond. Dieken, 67, has yet to set eyes on the flag, which is headed to a specialist in New York. By late summer, the flag is expected to return for exhibition in LaSalle County, 151 years after heading off to war with George Poundstone.

Page 5 of 5 - “I think it will touch people,” Dieken says. “I think everyone will have a sense of what these soldiers did.”

This story includes some information from civilwarindex.com, nytimes.com, civilwarinteractive.com, mobile.96.com and mywebtimes.com.

PHIL LUCIANO is a Journal Star columnist. He can be reached at pluciano@pjstar.com, facebook.com/philluciano, 686-3155 or (800) 225- 5757, Ext. 3155. Follow him on Twitter @LucianoPhil.